Lawforms

Digitised Legal Documents from the Indo-Persian World

Order of an official to Purshottam Das about a disruptive revenue officer

In response to a petition from Purshottam Das, an official orders the revenue officer (karori) to stop displacing the people of Sultanpur and instead settle the people and improve agriculture.

Functional document type: Orders

Formal document type: Parvana

Themes: Administration, Desertion and Depopulation, Petitioning

Date:
Gregorian calendar: 1650 – 1659

[Page 1r]

invocation (top centre): Arabic

الله اکبر

God is great

main text: Persian


1زبده الاقران پرسوتمداس چودری پرگنه جاملی و هندوله را انها آنکه
2 عرضه داشتی که درینولا مشتمل بر کیفیت بیجا شدن مردم مهاجن و
3خوش باش قصبه سلطانپور از بی سلوکی کروری آنجا قلمی نموده
4ارسال داشته بود رسید و بر آن آگهی رفت و آنچه درین
5ماده باستی بکروری آنجا نوشت نگاشته با این رقیمه نزد او
6فرستاده آمد باید که باو برساند و باتفاق تسلی انجماعه نموده بمکان
7اصلی آباد سازد و رعایا را مستمال ساخته در مزید زراعت و افزونی
8کشتکار سرگرم دارد که باعث مجرای او در این خواهد بود زیاده تاکید [نرفت]


1Eminent among Contemporaries Purshottam Das chaudhri of pargana Jamli and Hindola is informed that
2the petition containing the account of the displacement of the well-off and
3important people of the town of Sultanpur due to the ill behaviour of the karori of that place, that he had presently put in writing
4and had been sent, was received. And on account of that the information arose and whatever
5was written [in] a writing to the karori regarding this matter of lowliness, it was sent to him
6with this letter. It is essential that [this writing] shall be delivered to him, and that by causing the consolation of those people
7he will make [them] settled in the original home. And having concilliated the peasants, he shall be occupied in the increase of cultivation
8and the enlargement of husbandry for the cause of his progress will be in this. More compulsion [shall not arise].

invocation (right margin): Arabic

الله اکبر

God is great

authorisation (right margin): Persian


1اگر راستی بوده [بصلح با یکدیگر الحاف]
2کرده معامله پرگنه جاملی هندوله را از قرار
3واقع خواهد پرداخت [نوری...] آنها است
4و اگر [اجاه] خصومت بمیان اوردند که نتیجه
5نیک نخواهد یافت زیاده چه نوشت
6 [بنده] شاه جهان


1If is true, [compelling [them] to compromise with one another]
2the affairs of pargana Jamli and Hindola
3shall be as fixed. is of them
4And if they cause quarrels to arise, the result
5will not be good. What more was written.
6[Round black ink seal] [servant of] Shah Jahan1

Notes

1. The document is undated, so a date has been ascribed using 1650, when Purshottam Das is known to become active, as an opening bound and the end of the reign of Shah Jahan, i.e. 1659, as a closing bound on the basis of this seal. However, it is possible the seal continued to be used afterward. Purshottam Das was involved in a similar incident in 1669. See Chatterjee, Negotiating Mughal Law, p. 137. [BACK]

district

Revenue head of the Mughal Imperial household domains (possibly also a noble's diwan, see N.A. Siddiqi, Land Revenue Administration under the Mughals)

Revenue head of the Mughal Imperial household domains (possibly also a noble's diwan, see N.A. Siddiqi, Land Revenue Administration under the Mughals)

district

Participants

Supplicant: Purshottam Das

Language(s)

Arabic
Persian

Source

Choudhary Family Collection, Bada Raola Dhar, no shelfmark
Archival Collection: Purshottam Das collection

Transcribed from manuscript image.

Edited by Nandini Chatterjee and Elizabeth Thelen

Encoding support and website development by Lizzy Williamson, Eva Bodenschatz, Richard Holding, Julia Hopkin and Gary Stringer